Parshas Vayetzei: Jacob’s Ladder Teaches us to Strive for Perfection

On the eve of my Shabbat Kallah, the Shabbat celebration that preceded our wedding, my Rebbetzin, Rebbetzin Devorah Eisenbach, took me aside and wanted to give me one piece of advice for my marriage: Don’t have expectations.  Expectations (of anything and of anyone) are what cause us discontent, disappointment, and unhappiness.  We expect things to happen, we expect our vision to be fulfilled, and when it does not happen, we get upset.

Of course, we do have certain expectations that are normal and healthy.  We all have expectations of ourselves.   We expect ourselves to be able to do a certain thing, act a certain way, reach a certain goal.  It is one thing to disappoint another person who was counting on you, but it is much more serious when you disappoint yourself.  When you fall short of your own expectations, the wound can cut much deeper.

Many of us learn to cope with this when we are still small children.  We wake up one day expecting to fly, then we jump up and down but realize we can’t quite “blast off.”  We wake up another day expecting to get a perfect grade on that project – then come home to our parents in tears because we got a poor grade.  (Or maybe that was just me because I was a real dork!)  Some kids wake up expecting to impress their friends with a new magic trick or skateboard move, only to find that when they try to show off, they can’t quite manage it.  All of these are expectations we have of ourselves that are disappointed.  So, as children, we learn to expect a little bit less of ourselves, in order that we will be less disappointed in the future.

Not me. I’m a perfectionist.  Now, this often comes back to haunt me because I, like every other person on the planet, am not perfect.  Yet, I expect perfection of myself and so am disappointed daily.  In some respects, I know I have to learn to let go.  If I don’t make as much money as I expected, if I don’t get that job I expected myself to get, I have to acknowledge that at the end of the day it was really Hashem who was in control, not me, and so I have no right of expectations or disappointment.  But in other things, I think we must all become perfectionists, even if we currently are not.

When it comes to Torah and mitzvot (good deeds), it is easy to say that there are simply too many, or that they are too hard.  When it comes to perfecting our middot (character traits), we are told it is such a difficult thing to do that it is easier to memorize the entire Gemara!  So how can we expect perfection from ourselves in these things?

To find the answer, we need only climb Jacob’s ladder.  This week is the parsha where Yaakov (Jacob) runs away from his homeland.  He comes to a place (a very holy place, Mount Moriah, where the Temple was later built) and he lays down to sleep.  As he sleeps, he has a dream.  There are angels going up and there are angels going down. Then the angels go back up and the angels come back down.  Why on earth are they going up and down? Did they just need some exercise or something?

There are many answers to this question, but I happen to hold close to my heart one I heard from Rabbi Ephraim Shapiro.

You see, in shemayim (heaven) there is an image of ourselves as we could be if we achieved our highest potential.  Imagine Albert Einstein decided not to be a physicist… imagine he decided to be a beggar instead.  When he eventually reached shemayim, he would see all that he could have done, had he gone after his true potential. Imagine the disappointment!  Every single one of us will have a moment, when we pass on to the World To Come, where we will see what we could have been.  If we did not strive to be all that we could be, we will see and be disappointed, but it will be too late to change anything.  What we should be doing is chasing perfection now – and that means spiritual perfection, not physical beauty or money – and not selling ourselves short by expecting anything less.

The reason Rabbi Shapiro gave for why the angels were going up and down is because they were stunned to see a person who had reached his full potential.  Yaakov’s spiritual image in this world was exactly the same as in the world to come.  He had achieved what we should all be working toward – our own individual tikkun (spiritual perfection or mission) here on earth.

This week, let us all focus on striving to achieve our full spiritual potential.  We are all capable of doing the mitzvot and improving our middot – we need only try.  And try we must, so we can reach our fullest potential.  Let us all stop selling ourselves short! Shabbat shalom!